


A Canary's Gift

by jonsasnow



Series: Olicity Baby One Shots [2]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Baby Shower, F/M, Pregnancy, olicity - Freeform, olicity baby, season 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-27
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-03 15:38:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5296844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonsasnow/pseuds/jonsasnow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sara is asked by Felicity to throw her a baby shower and she struggles with what coming back to Star City entails for her and her relationship with her family and friends. Not to mention the struggle of dealing with a very heavily pregnant and emotional Felicity Smoak.</p><p>Sort of Sequel to A New Future.</p><p>Now includes a bonus scene with Oliver and Felicity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was prompted by a friend on tumblr because we both adore Felicity and Sara's friendship so much xD 
> 
> I don't know how well I portrayed Sara but I really enjoyed writing this. I may have indulged myself by adding a bit of a Sara and Laurel heart-to-heart that I thought the show was lacking on. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope you like it!

"How've you been?"

"Oh, the usual - trying not to kill anyone," Thea said while examining a breast pump. She placed it back on the shelf with a tiny grimace and turned to smile at Sara. "On account of the bloodlust, you know?"

Sara cracked a smile and nodded. Oh, she knew. Six months away from Star City had done nothing for her state of mind. There was a constant burning itch on the inside of her skull that she couldn't quite scratch and the one time she found relief it came in the form of a belligerent drunk who had pulled out a gun on an unsuspecting woman. Something inside of her snapped then and Sara had lost complete control of her body. Anger had raged through her like a lightning bolt, electrifying everything she touched and turning it into something horrible.

Thea had warned her this would happen - and it wasn't as if this was the first person she had ever killed. But that loss of control, that unbridled rage and need to feel someone's last pulsating breath escape their lips was terrifying for even a seasoned assassin like Sara. She wondered if the bloodlust would ever go away - if normalcy or as close to it as was possible would ever return.

"It gets better," Thea placed a hand on Sara's forearm and smiled, "not always and not frequently but some days I almost forget about it."

"How?" Sara's eyes crinkled as she pulled away gently. She made for the next aisle. The constant movement at least occupied a part of her brain that kept the hysteria and self-loathing at bay. Years with the League of Assassins had taught her to compartmentalise everything and it was the one good thing she took from them.

"You never give up trying," Thea trailed along behind her, keeping her voice low so no one could overhear their conversation, but that wasn't even a possibility. The din of noise in the store was enough to drown out their voices even if they had been speaking at a normal decibel. "You surround yourself with people who love you."

That was a hint.

Sara could tell, but she couldn't return. Not when she couldn't control the bloodlust. She would never forgive herself if anything were to happen to Laurel and her father.

Instead, Sara stopped walking and threw Thea a smile. "That's what this weekend is for, isn't it?"

Thea snorted and rolled her eyes. "I thought this weekend was for teaching us never to cross 'You Know Who.'"

Sara laughed and was surprised by the genuine sound of it. It had been a long while since she laughed so easily and without pretence, but 'You Know Who' had a way of bringing that side out of her, even when 'You Know Who' wasn't around.

"Speaking of," Sara said and brought up her phone for Thea to read. "It's 'You Know Who' now."

She swiped to answer and inhaled deeply. "Hi Felicity. Yes, we're at the store now. No, I promise we won't overdo it. I know. I know. It won't be big. No, of course we have to do this. No, you can't get out of this by inviting Damien Dahrk. Stop fretting - here's Thea."

Sara mouthed 'sorry' and handed the phone over. Thea took it and sighed. "Hey, how are you feeling? Oh, uhh... Wow, that sounds bad. No, no, no, I get the point. Okay, I promise to make sure Ollie knows that. Bye, Felicity." She returned the phone back to Sara. "She is  _insane_ , like scary insane. I think we should just put all the evil bad guys in a room with her and that would scare them all straight."

This made Sara laugh again - even harder still when she imagined how some of the horrible people she had crossed in her lifetime would fare in a room with a very heavily pregnant Felicity Smoak. They were nothing in comparison to the small, feisty blonde. 

"You might be right. We should try it with Malcolm." 

Thea's eyes sparkled at this and a sinister smile pulled at her lips. When she did that, it always reminded her of Ollie. He had the same mischievous smile. "I can arrange that but I'm worried Felicity might end up killing Ras al Ghul and if she has a whole army of assassins behind her command, we're all doomed."

"That's true. Maybe not then." 

For the next forty minutes, the two women walked around the baby store and picked up an assortment of gifts. Some necessary for every new parent and some Sara and Thea just thought would be cute for the baby. Sara could feel her shoulders slowly unwinding throughout the day and for once she allowed herself to be happy. Today was not about her. It was not about any of them. It was about a tiny little baby, so innocent and so pure, growing inside of Felicity - a product of love and joy. For that little baby, Sara would fight to keep her head above waters. 

They returned to the loft with all of their shopping bags and dropped them with a loud thud onto the wooden floor. Oliver had promised to keep Felicity out while they set up so he had taken her round to John and Lyla's apartment. He figured if Felicity was around Lyla, she would feel better because there was someone there that understood what she was going through, and from the four hours Sara spent with Felicity this morning, that something was a lot. Her body had completely transformed from the last time Sara saw her. She would never say it to Felicity but the tiny blonde had expanded three times her size. Well, her belly had.

"Do you think the banner should go here above the windows or above the door?"

Sara looked up from unpacking the shopping bags. She had never been good at this sort of thing. Even before the island and the league, Sara had been more of the party- _go_ er rather than the party planner. She tried to imagine the large banner that Thea had had one of Ollie's campaign officers make above the windows then tried to imagine it above the entrance. "The windows because then she'd see it right away."

"Oh, good point!"

Thea grabbed a step ladder and went to work pinning the banner along the length of the windows. Silence drew out between the two women as they worked in setting up Felicity's baby shower. By two o'clock, Laurel arrived with a petite blonde woman in a tight bright blue bandage dress in tow. Her sister's eyes widened slightly for effect as she pointed to the woman behind her back and mouthed 'Felicity's mom'. Sara's mouth gaped slightly and she repeated the word to herself quietly. " _M_ _om_?" The reality that this woman being the mother of the feisty tech genius that Sara had come to know was mind-boggling, yet even as she continued to gape at her, everything about Felicity suddenly became clearer to her. 

"You must be Donna Smoak," Thea exclaimed as she rushed forward. "I'm Ollie's sister, Thea. And that's Sara, Laurel's sister." 

Sara smiled in response. 

"Ooh, it's so lovely to meet all of you!" Donna cooed before shaking Sara's hand but when she went to shake Thea's, she paused and lingered just a little longer before without warning embraced her in a tight hug. "We're going to be family!" 

If Thea was taken aback by this, she didn't show it. She just returned the hug and laughed in that carefree way that the Queens had been so notorious for once upon a time. "How was your flight?" 

"Long," Donna said with a dismissive shrug. "I don't care for flying but I wasn't going to miss my only daughter's first baby shower. I would have walked here if I had to!" 

Sara could see it now. That infectious optimism and perkiness - it appeared to be a Smoak family trait. 

"Enough about me," Donna clapped her hands together. "Let's get ready for this shower." 

With two extra hands, the loft was completely set up ahead of schedule, leaving time for Sara to meander away from the group to the outside balcony. She leaned forward onto the railing and breathed in Star City. For all the pain and tragedy that had devastated this city, it was still home and being back here only reminded her of that fact all too poignantly. Sara would gladly return if she could positively ensure that her presence wouldn't just cause more heartache, but even though today had eased the itch, she knew that the bloodlust still burned inside of her. The risk of staying here was too great on her family and friends. She wasn't like Thea. Sara had lost her soul; she had been  _dead_ for over a year. Coming back from that was going to take a lot more than six months away from everyone. It could take years, or even forever. 

"Hey," Laurel's voice filtered through the music and laughter from inside as she opened the sliding door to come stand beside Sara. "Are you okay?" 

"If I said I was fine, would you believe me?"

"No."

"I'm handling it," Sara offered instead. 

"Is there anything I can do?" 

Sara turned to look at her sister. She understood why Laurel had done what she did, why she had gone through such lengths to bring Sara back, but a part of her wished Laurel had just let her stay dead. "Not this time, sis."

There was a beat of silence as both sisters stared out into the city. Neither knew what to say to the other and for a few minutes, they stood together without saying a word, letting only the comfort of each other's company warm them. Winter had come and gone but the remnants of its grasp on the city remained. The cold lingered on Sara's skin but she didn't flinch. She noticed Laurel however hugged her jacket tighter around her body. Sara couldn't remember anymore if it was the league that had numbed her in this way or if it was the Lazarus Pit. Every piece of darkness from Sara's past had now merged together in her mind.

"I'm sorry."

"What?"

"I'm sorry, Sara," Laurel said again, this time more firmly than before, "for everything you're going through. It's all my fault and I know that now. I couldn't live in a world where you didn't exist and I dragged you back for my own selfish reasons." 

"Hey." Sara pulled her sister into a hug and sighed into her body. "I can handle it, Laurel, and I told you - I am so grateful for everything you've ever done for me because I know that you did it out of love. You're my big sister. You're always going to be looking out for me." 

"But I wasn't," she said, pulling back to look at Sara. "I was looking out for _me_. I just wanted the pain to stop. I just wanted you back. I never thought about what that might do to you."  


"You did what you thought was right," Sara told her. "I'm alive and I'm going to be fine. You did that, Laurel. Thank you." 

Laurel smiled then and hugged Sara once more. "I love you." 

"I love you too. Now let's get back inside. They'll be here any moment now." 

As the two Lance sisters walked back into the loft, maybe Sara even started to believe it too - that she could be fine one day, that she could someday return to Star City and be with her family again.

Everything went off without a hitch. Felicity, Ollie, Lyla and John arrived precisely at four o'clock with Oliver helping Felicity waddle into the loft. Her blue eyes brightened considerably and she let out a small squeak of joy. Sara and Thea glanced at each other and smiled. When Felicity had called and begged Sara to throw her a baby shower with Thea so that her mom would not, Sara had been doubtful of the outcome of that. She had never in her life thrown anyone a baby shower or even been to a baby shower, but being partnered with Thea had made everything easier. The younger woman had practically run a successful nightclub at the age of nineteen and was helping spearhead Ollie's mayoral campaign. She knew how to throw a party. 

After Felicity made the rounds, saying hi and thanks to everyone gathered in the loft, she wandered over to Sara and pulled her up the stairs to the bedroom she shared with Ollie. Sara had thought it'd be weird to see how domestic Ollie had become with Felicity since he was her ex-boyfriend but Sara had always known. Even when they were together, she knew that Ollie never really loved her. How could he when the person he had probably been in love with from the start was someone else? "I have to admit something," Felicity said in a hushed voice. "I sort of asked you to do it because I thought you would just make it really small and there'd be no flashy signs or anything like that - but this, everything here, it's -" Felicity sniffed and tears began to well up in her eyes. "Oh god, I told myself I wouldn't cry today but I can't help it. Just this morning I started bawling when Oliver dropped my pancake on the floor and I mean wailing, Sara. There was snot and tantrums." 

Sara put a hand on Felicity's shoulder and laughed. "It's okay. You're allowed to be a bit emotional."

"A  _bit_?" she scoffed with wide eyes as a tear slid down her face. "I cried over a pancake! A  _pancake_!" Suddenly, her tears continued to fall at a more rapid pace. "Oh no, I'm thinking about that pancake now and it's just making me cry even more." 

Biting down on her bottom lip to stifle her bubbling laughter, Sara pulled Felicity into a hug while the other woman continued to sob. "It's okay, it's okay. Do you want pancakes? I'll have Ollie make you some right now."

"I don't want pancakes!" Felicity cried. "I wanted  _that_ pancake. It was so nice and round."

Sara disguised a chuckle with a cough before she muffled her mouth into Felicity's hair.

"I'm sorry," Felicity eventually said. She pulled away and wiped her puffy eyes with the back of her hand. Sara went over to their nightstand and grabbed a couple of tissues for Felicity who took it graciously. "These hormones are making me crazy, like loony bin crazy. I can't stop crying and I can't stop yelling at Oliver." 

"I'm sure he understands, Felicity."

"He _has_ been so understanding," she sighed with a smile. "He's been so wonderful in so many different ways."

And there it was, that look in her eyes. It had been the same look Oliver wore on his face every time he caught sight of his very pregnant girlfriend. This overwhelming, transcendent sort of love, something Sara knew nothing of, but the funny thing was she didn't even feel remotely jealous. Maybe it was because she had long since given up hope that she could have any kind of life with someone she loved or maybe it was because after everything Oliver had been through, she was just simply happy that he found what he had been searching for.    

"Oh, I remember now why I brought you up here," Felicity suddenly exclaimed. She gave her head a little thump and went over to an old antique chest of drawers and opened the third drawer down. She rummaged through for a few seconds before pulling out a purple velvet drawstring pouch. She went to sit on the bed and gestured for Sara to do the same.

"We've asked John and Lyla to be the baby's godparents - you know so if anything were to happen to Oliver and me, the baby would go to them. They already have baby Sara and we know they're amazing parents, and Thea's already aunt by blood. The only person missing from this one's life is you and before you say anything because I know you will since it's you and you and Oliver are so alike that way, let me finish." She pulled back the drawstring and took out a white gold necklace attached to a canary pendant. "I've never had a lot of female friends, or any I guess," Felicity laughed. "And so you were my first." She paused and her eyes widened. "Female friend I mean. Not... the other thing. Oh god, do you think becoming a mother will stop me from saying double entendres every five seconds?"

"No, I really hope not," Sara laughed.

Felicity chuckled and sighed. " _Anyway_ , as I was saying, you helped me find my confidence when I was struggling to believe in myself and you've always been so important to Oliver. We both wanted you to have this as a thank you." She then pulled out a similar white gold chain but this one was smaller and instead of a canary pendant, it was a tiny canary charm. "When  _she's_ a little older, we'll give this to her so she knows she has another aunt out there who might not be blood but also just as important." 

Sara struggled to find the words. She wanted to say thank you and tell her she didn't deserve this but the small token from Felicity and Oliver had stunned Sara to silence. Felicity nodded in understanding and placed the necklace into Sara's hands. 

"It's also a reminder for you," Felicity continued, "that you don't have to live in the shadows anymore. You have so much more light inside of you than you think." 

 

******************

 

Four months later, Sara would end up in an alleyway with a thug in Costa Rica demanding her to give up her money. The bloodlust would return in full force, itching for her to kill again, but she would hold back because of a small white gold pendant that lay above her heart, reminding her of a tiny one month old Elizabeth Moira Queen, and she would walk away with clean hands and a clean conscience. 

 


	2. Bonus Scene: Oliver and Felicity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't help myself :)
> 
> I was talking to my friend about how Felicity would probably threaten Oliver repeatedly after finding out he had told Donna that she could host a baby shower and it spiralled from there.
> 
> So ta-dah! Here's a little bonus scene Pre-A Canary's Gift. Hope you like it!

“You did  _what_?” 

Oliver backed away slowly. He had handled earthquake machines, Mirakuru soldiers and the League of Assassins, yet staring at the deep scowling face of his heavily pregnant girlfriend, he suddenly  _really_  feared for his life.

“I thought that it’d be nice and she seemed so excited to do it.”

“Oliver, please,  _please_ , tell me you’re joking,” Felicity pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed angrily. “Please tell me you didn’t just give my  _mother_  permission to throw me a baby shower.”

“I... didn’t?”

“You did. Oh my god, you did!” she tried to get up but moving around these days was extremely hard on Felicity’s sore feet and Oliver suspected that she couldn’t quite get up either without help - and he seriously doubted she’d ask for his help right now. “It’s a sickness, isn’t it? You have a serious horrible sickness that makes you cave to my mom every time she texts you, don’t you?”

“Well, actually she calls now,” he said. Oliver didn’t know why he had felt compelled to tell her that but for a man who spent most of his life keeping secrets, lying to Felicity was unbelievably hard. 

“She  _calls_? You and my mom talk on the phone?” 

“She calls once a week. To ask me how you’re doing. She says you never really text her back so she has to find out somehow.” 

“Oh my god, Oliver.” Felicity started to shimmy her way down the sofa. Instantaneously, Oliver moved to help her but she placed one hand up to stop him from doing just that. “Don’t touch me. I can get off of a sofa by myself. I am not so totally incompetent now just because I’m carrying your spawn!” 

“My spawn?” Oliver asked bemused. 

“Yes,” Felicity said with finality as she glared him down. "If you don't reverse this, so help me, Oliver Queen, I'm going to invite Damien Dahrk to the baby shower and see what happens."

"You wouldn't." 

"I might," Felicity muttered before attempting to move again. She eventually made it off of the sofa and walked over to their kitchen counter. 

“What are you doing?” 

“Getting my phone to fix your mistake,” she growled back at him. She typed something onto her phone before placing it to her ear. Oliver waited patiently to see what she was about to do. He knew better now than ever not to push her when she was angry. Normally, an un-pregnant angry Felicity was enough to make him quiet, but a very pregnant Felicity made him a little more cautious and wary - and if he was honest, a little more in love with her every time as well.

“Sara?” 

Oliver’s ears perked up at the name and he eyed her curiously. What was she up to? 

“It’s me, Felicity. Something’s happened - no, everyone’s fine, but Oliver’s not,” Felicity turned to scowl at him again, “Not unless you come back and do me a favour before I kill him.” She chuckled at something Sara said. “He might be the father of my unborn child but I  _will_  still kill him... Because he called my mom and told her she could throw me a baby shower! - no, that’s  _not_  a good thing! Sara,  _pleeaaase._ I need you to throw me a baby shower instead - it’s okay that you don’t know anything about babies. Me neither! It’ll be perfect... Because if my mom did it, it’ll be over the top and crazy and it’ll stress me out and the doctors said stress is bad for babies. Do you want to stress out my baby?” Felicity now smiled triumphantly. “Good. I’ll see you this weekend. Bye!”

In the time that she had taken to talk to Sara, Oliver had walked up behind her and he now placed his arms around her waist, his hands resting gently over the large bump. “I’m sorry.” He kissed her on her cheek. 

She harrumphed and stayed silent but she didn’t push him away so he counted that as a win.

“I’ll make you pancakes...”

“With chocolate chips and bananas and whipped cream?” Felicity suddenly asked with wide-eyed glee. Oliver nodded and she threw her arms around his neck, planting a very appreciative kiss on his lips. 

Oliver had never been more glad that he had learned how to cook in those five months away with Felicity. It was certainly coming in handy now. 


End file.
